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Mark, can you not resize the image down to fit? If you don't have the software to be able to do this, check out Irfanview - it's freeware and powerful while being easy to use. http://www.irfanview.com/

Thanks Lily Of The Valley. I took a look at the auction you mentioned - 7424598262 - and discovered one possible new fact, but only a possibility. The seller claims the sulphide paperweight up for sale has the date 1971 and a series number on the base.

But the seller doesn't state if the date is scratch-signed or part of the St. Clair hot stamp (die-cast) look. My mystery "bearded gentleman" weight has the St. Clair hot stamp, but no date. My mystery "lady-in-pearls" weight has both the St. Clair mark and the date hot stamped.

I will have to ask the seller if the date on the bearded fellow base is scratched-on or part of the St. Clair stamp.

However, the paperweight sulphide is of the the same man. But the seller doesn't offer a name or description.

All of this brings us to another question. If the date is stamped, why wasn't mine stamped with a date? Just another mid-west glassmakers' mystery and a question for someone who worked at St. Clair to answer, not to mention Joe Rice answering.

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After looking at a U.S. government portrait and photographic website that has wonderful official photographs and portraits of U.S. presidents and their wives, I've decided that the mystery "bearded fellow" in the St. Clair sulphide paperweight is one of the 19th-century U.S. presidents, Ulysses S. Grant.

I have to admire the ability of whoever made the sulphide at, or for, St. Clair to accurately capture Grant's crinkly eyes and puffy cheeks. It really is very nice cameo work.

I looked at the possible men, including presidents Garfield and Hayes, and there are things about both men that don't match up with the sulphide's cameo representation. So, until proven totally wrong, I'm going with Grant.

As for the mystery woman - possibilities included the Queen, Evangeline Bergstrom and Mamie Eisenhower. Based on the U.S. government site, I think the sulphide is Mamie, wife of President Dwight David "Ike" Eisenhower. Here, the cameo artist did a great job capturing the pearls and the slight nod of Mamie's head. The hair is dead-on as well.

Now I really want to know who was working at St. Clair. Who made these paperweights? Who's the cameo artist? Why were some presidents and their wives selected and not others? Is there a larger series that few have seen? Where are all the paperweights? Information hints that maybe 300-400 of each weight were made. Why the heck isn't there a St. Clair glass museum? Does Joe Rice have some of these? Is there a cache of St. Clair paperweights boxed away? Where are the company papers? It seems that this sulphide work was done in the early 1970s. Why? Just another batch of questions, I guess, that may not be answered.

You can see both of these paperweights in the first post in this thread.

Here are images of the actual people, Grant and Mamie, as captured and preserved in photos:

Uh oh Liz, here we go again. The sulphide cameo to which you refer looks exactly like my sulphide cameo. The backgrounds are different. And, the seller doesn't state anything about a scratched number on the base; AND the seller states the weight is signed with an impressed Joe St. Clair, whereas mine is signed with an impressed St. Clair and has the scratched number 341.

Of course, it doesn't look anything like James Garfield's official photograph on the U.S. government website.

The only explanation might be that the seller of this weight has not gotten the attribution right and thinks that the cameo is of Garfield, but is in fact Ulysses S. Grant. It sure looks more like Grant.